Putting Words in Your Mouth
by Oxymoronic Alliteration
Summary: Tim meets with a therapist to discuss some emotionally traumatic experiences. Written for the NFA Community If You've Got a Problem, I Can Help Challenge.


The room is dimly lit. Only the sun pouring through the windows from outside provides illumination to the room. It is silent, save for the soft whirring of the fan above him and the white noise machine tucked away in the corner. It's cold; the cold isn't a temperature kind of chill, though. It just feels so…bare. No warmth.

She sits in the chair, pen and pad in hand, with one leg crossed atop the other. Her glasses are pushed up to the top of her head as she reads over her notes. He lies on the couch, staring up at the ceiling fan. His hands are clasped together as they rest on his chest. He is silent, waiting for her to speak first.

"Agent McGee," she says.

"Yes."

"What brings you to see me?"

"I wrote why on my information sheet."

"I know that," she says calmly, "but I want to hear you explain it."

He sighs. He fidgets a bit.

"Let me start you off," she offers. "You claim you are emotionally distraught by the way you are treated."

He nods. "Yes. Yes, that's right."

"Do you mean the way you are treated by your co-workers?"

"No…I mean, they sometimes rag on me…call me names…make fun of me…"

"But that isn't the problem here," she finally concludes. "Do you mean your family then?"

"No," he says again, "my family is wonderful to me."

She leans forward in her seat, chin resting on intertwined fingers. "So then who are you talking about?"

His face turns red and he closes his eyes. "Them," he whispers.

"Who is 'them'?"

"The people who put me through it all."

"Through what?"

"Everything! They've put me through everything! I've been kidnapped and tortured in ways I don't even like to think about! I've been stripped down naked and pushed out into the cold with nothing more than a towel for warmth! I've had my life threatened, my body tormented, and my mind messed with!"

She puts a hand on his arm to calm him. "It's okay, Agent McGee," she says soothingly. "Let's just start at the beginning. How did this begin?"

He settles back down into the couch, his lips pouting out. "It was nice at first," he admits. "I mean, I always thought I would fade into the background as nothing more than the comic relief. I'm not the hunky hero; I'm the computer geek."

"Are you saying computer geeks cannot be attractive?"

"No!" he bellows defiantly. "It's not that I don't consider myself attractive, but I know I'm not as macho as Tony is."

"You enjoyed the attention."

"Initially, yes. As it went on, though, I grew more and more uneasy about it."

"And why is that?"

"How would you feel if someone had you abducted and tortured?"

She grins wryly. "Point taken."

"But even then, I was okay," he tells her. "The good guys always won and it's not as though they were killing me off."

"What changed?"

He shifts in his place. She can tell he is uncomfortable talking about it. "It just became too much," he says softly. "It was only one or two people at first. Then it grew into a couple more…and a couple more…and so on…"

"You're overwhelmed by the number of people using you."

"Exactly!" He leans back, eyes closed, shaking his head sadly. "It's so much stress…"

"You're a fictional character, Timothy. You can't actually feel anything. It's all in your head."

"Just because I can't actually feel it doesn't mean it doesn't affect me!" he snaps. His face has grown red and his breathing has increased. "I'm traumatized by it all the same."

"It's not always so bad," she tells him. "Not all of the stories involving pain and torture."

"No, some of them involving embarrassment and nudity and sex with every female character I've ever come in contact with, as well as a few completely original female characters."

"So you don't wish to engage in sex with a female character?" she asked. "Would you prefer one of the male characters?"

"It's not about the gender! I like sex! I just don't like it so frequently! Everyone has their sexual limit!"

"I see." She jots down a few notes. "Any other complaints?"

"I don't want to be tied to beds by anymore crazy Thom E. Gemcity fans. In fact, I don't want to have anything to do with Thom E. Gemcity fans! I wish _Deep Six_ had never been published!"

"Would you prefer you were ignored completely?"

He sighs, running a hand through his hair. "No," he admits. "I like having the attention. I mean, it's nice to feel appreciated, even if in literary form. I just wish a story could go by with no kidnapping, no torture, no pain—physical, emotional, or mental—, no nudity, no embarrassment, no sex, and absolutely no crazy fans!"

She pauses, unsure how to respond to his ranting. Finally, she says, "But Timothy, what kind of a story would it be if it had none of those things? You need something to give the writer a reason to write the story in the first place. Would it be that interesting to simply have you do nothing and have nothing happen to you?"

"None of that has happened so far in this story, has it?" he asks. "This story has none of that and yet it's being written."

"Au contraire!" she says with a smirk. "This story has you going through torment. You've just spent almost the entire story explaining how tormented you are by fanfiction writers. If you weren't in a state of despair, you wouldn't need a therapist at all, now would you?"

He pouts, but doesn't argue. She is right and he knows it. "This isn't so bad, though. I'm just lying here talking. No physical pain or nudity or…or crazy fans!" he spits out.

"No, there is none of that…yet."

He looks at her in a mixture of confusion and fear. "What are you saying?"

"You have no control, Timothy. The words are written and you must obey. You could be nude in the next paragraph. You could be kidnapped and in a state of torture in only a couple of descriptive sentences. The story could even be cut off here, only to be picked up in the next chapter with you and me in the throes of ecstasy."

He shoots up. "No!" he proclaims. "No! I have control over myself."

He stops.

"See?" she says as he is stopped in place. "The words appear and you comply."

He sits back down on the couch. "Please," he begs her, "make it stop!"

"Do you think I have any more control than you do?" she asks in amusement. "I'm just a nameless original character. I have no power."

"But aren't you just a sly self-insert by the author? You're an extension of her own personality in fanfiction form."

"Hard to tell. I've not yet been developed enough to decipher whether or not I'm supposed to represent the author herself."

He frowns. "You must be," he insists.

She grins slyly. "I think that if I were the author's self-insert, you and I would be engaged in a much different activity on that couch."

"Don't!" he says in a harsh whisper. "You'll give her ideas!"

"I think she already has a few ideas," she says. She leans forward, forcing him to lean back until his back hits the back of the couch. "Now what do you say we make this meeting a bit more…private?"

He nods. He has no choice. The words appear; he follows their orders.

It's nice to be in control.

* * *

**The End!**


End file.
